「 GIVE ME YOUR HAND 」

THE WEATHER GREW MERCILESS. PROTECTED though they were by the strong walls of the castle, the cold entered in waves through the large open balconies and seeped through droughts and any opening. When they weren't in classes, students remained in the confines of their common rooms, huddled in front of their respective fireplaces.

One good thing came out of this though - the incessant storms and the cold subdued the Carrows enough to allow the students to get a breath of fresh air. They wanted to escape into their own chambers as much as the students did, and thus as November drew on excruciatingly slowly, the castle took on a desolate state. The corridors were walked on only between classes, and most of the time they remained miserably empty, to the point that any visitor who should happen to enter the premises would only see a solitary, abandoned castle.

The day before their Hogsmeade weekend, Theo found himself walking eagerly to the Divination classroom. Trelawney's room, at least, could be counted on being excessively hot and thus he looked forward to settling himself down in the stuffy room and taking off his gloves and several layers of clothes for once.

He climbed up the ladder and entered through the trapdoor to get into the low, dark room. He felt a rush of gratefulness for Trelawney, for the sudden warmth was enough to drive away any negative thoughts from his mind. For the next one and a half hour, he was sure to be in bliss, with no Carrows and no war invading the peace of his mind.

He found Daphne sitting on one of the twenty tables scattered around the room and made his way to her. They were the only Slytherins to take Divination for NEWT level, and as he sat down, the classroom began to fill up with other Gryffindors, Ravenclaws, and Hufflepuffs. Despite all four houses being gathered here, the room was barely half full - Divination wasn't one of the favourite subjects.

Theo took off his gloves and cloak and stashed them clumsily under the table, giving out a relieved sigh. It was a well-established fact, though never proven or verified, that Professor Trelawney added something to her fire to infuse the air with odd scents that had a drug-like effect on her students. Theo found himself getting sleepy.

"Going to Hogsmeade tomorrow?"

Daphne's voice pulled him away from the stupor he had fallen into. He blinked several times to get rid of the sudden drowsiness and looked around him. The entire class has gathered and Trelawney's lips moved as she walked amongst the tables, though Theo barely heard her. He decided to pay attention to Daphne instead.

"Yeah, I'm going with Blaise."

She raised an eyebrow as she looked at him. "Finally talking again?" He nodded. "I'll go too. I wasn't really eager to go but Astoria is going and I'm not going to let her walk into a hoard of dementors alone."

The mention of dementors caused a cold shiver to run down his spine. Annoyed, he said, "Can you not bring up dementors in every conversation? I'm trying to pretend they don't exist and you're not helping."

She narrowed her eyes. "Fine. I'll just pretend that we aren't surrounded by soul-eating creatures, and that will definitely keep them from coming into the castle and devouring us whole."

"Well, there's nothing you can do about them, so why talk about it at all?"

Theo realised he had raised his voice a moment too late. Daphne kicked him under the table, but that was unnecessary. The entire class stared at him with eyes shining with amusement, and Trelawney whose eyes sparkled with fire. The two Gryffindor girls, who admired the professor perhaps a little too much, glared at him in reproach for disrespecting her.

"Does Mr Nott have anything he would like to share with the class?" asked Professor Trelawney.

He sighed and shook his head.

"Please tell us what we have been discussing so far."

Theo stole a glance at Daphne, silently asking for help, but she shrugged. She had no clue either.

"We were discussing, uhm, crystal ball reading," he said uncertainly. By the suppressed grins from his fellow classmates, he could tell that he was wrong but Trelawney stared at him, waiting for him to continue, so he decided to suck it and make up stories. That had been helpful so far, so why not now? "You were saying that - that Harry Potter faces danger ahead of him and that - uh - he will - he will face death very soon." Although he had never shared Divination classes with the Gryffindors, he knew how Trelawney enjoyed making ominous predictions about the Chosen One and although she glared at him disapprovingly through her large glasses, the classroom was now filled with sounds of suppressed laughter. Theo couldn't remember the last time he had heard laughter in a class and he accepted his teacher's disapproval with satisfaction.

"Correct though you are in the statement," said Trelawney stiffly, "- I do admit I have been seeing horrible, horrible ends to the poor boy's life, bless him - we were not discussing crystal ball reading. I was asking my students to review the chapter on palm reading and try to read their partner's palm."

She swept her shawls dramatically and began to walk between the tables. "Well, what are you waiting for? Start."

With a sigh, Theo turned to his partner, Daphne, who grinned. "Good one," she mouthed.

The rest of the class was spent flipping through the pages of his book, taking turns reading each other's palms, and making up extravagant stories when Trelawney came to ask them what they had seen. Theo predicted that Daphne would choke to death while she predicted his winning of a great amount of gold, before announcing that he would be killed by someone for said gold.

The class was dismissed and he grabbed his gloves and cloak from under the table and descended the rickety ladder.

"That was fun," said Daphne, grinning.

"Yes, but you didn't have to kill me. I just won some gold. You could have let me have it."

"Trelawney wouldn't like it if we had happy endings," she said seriously. "She wants us to have a lousy future, ideally with horrible deaths."

Daphne had another class right after so they parted ways, Theo heading for the dungeons. He had a free period now, and so did Blaise. He hoped he would find him in the common room.

Blaise was in the dormitory, perusing a star chart. When Theo entered, he looked up at him and said, "I don't understand why we're getting Astronomy homework. I don't remember the last time I've seen the sky. What's the point?"

Theo smiled a little as he dropped his bag, gloves, and cloak on his bed. He took off his jumper and found a woolly scarf that he carefully wrapped around his head. His ears have gone numb and cold, and he thought that if he didn't wrap them up, they would freeze and fall off.

"Come to the common room?" he asked Blaise, who readily complied.

They chose a side of the common room that was barren of armchairs or sofas. Blaise dropped his star chart and some books on the floor and they flopped down against the wall. Theo messaged his hands while Blaise turned his attention to his homework.

"Anything new with Trelawney?" he asked.

"She was pleased with me because I predicted Potter's death."

"I don't understand why you still have that subject," said Blaise as he turned to face him, abandoning his homework with a resigned sigh. "It's stupid."

"I know. But I'm quite good so I felt bad dropping it."

"Really?" Blaise raised a sceptical eyebrow. "You can predict my future?"

Theo gave a lopsided grin. "I meant that I usually make up stuff when Trelawney tells us to predict something. She likes them and she gives me good marks."

"And you think that it's going to work out in the NEWTs?"

"Come on, Blaise. It doesn't even take much effort. It won't make a difference to my life if I drop it."

Blaise didn't seem convinced and continued to stare at him the same way one would stare at a suspicious person wearing a mask. His cheeks grew warm and since he did not have a fire close by to blame it on, he quickly said, "Give me your hand."

Blaise frowned. "Why?"

"Let me read your palm," he explained. "We did it today. Daphne read my palm and said that I'm going to win gold, but then someone will kill me in order to steal my gold."

Blaise gave an amused smile. "That's sad. You could've shared the gold with me. I'm going to go broke after tomorrow when I buy the entire stock of Honeydukes for you."

"Hand," Theo demanded.

"Left or right?"

"Left."

Blaise offered his left hand, palm side up. He gripped it gently and pulled his hand closer. Supporting it by the wrist with one hand, he held the tips of his fingers with the other and bent down to examine the lines on his palm.

To be perfectly honest, Theo had no idea what he was doing. He would have to confide in the book to understand what any of those lines meant but it felt nice to have Blaise's hand in his. He pretended to look thoughtful and chose a scraggly, barely visible line running across his palm.

"This line here," he began professionally, "says that you're going to get top marks in your NEWTs."

"Really?" Blaise pretended to sound eager at the information. "My palm says NEWTs?"

"Uh-huh," he nodded. "And this one says that you are going to lose something very precious to you." He looked up at Blaise meaningfully. "Very soon."

Blaise looked fearful. "Oh no. What could it be?"

"I don't know," he said seriously. "What do you hold most dear, Blaise?"

"That's a good question. I'd say my socks are very dear to me. They're rather expensive, you know?"

Theo broke character and laughed out. "Socks? That's the only thing you could think of?"

Blaise gave him a stern glare. "Please don't laugh, Mr Psychic. My socks are very precious to me."

"Okay, sorry." He cleared his throat and began again, leaning over Blaise's hand. "So you will lose your socks. I can't tell how. Maybe it will get stolen - wait! I can see it. There's a darkness growing over you. Oh no, this is bad. No, it can't be."

He looked up at Blaise with a sorrowful expression, the kind you might have at a funeral. "You will fall into the Black Lake, Zabini."

Blaise gasped. "You mean my socks will get wet?"

He shook his head vigorously. "That would be a blessing. No, it's much worse."

"Well, what is it?" Blaise urged.

"Your socks," he began, then paused for dramatic effect. "Your socks will be stolen by the Giant Squid."

A long silence followed this grave announcement. Then, all of a sudden, they both burst into peals of laughter. Heads turned their way as they laughed loudly, and it was several minutes before they both hiccoughed into silence.

"Well, I can see now why you haven't dropped the stupid subject yet," said Blaise.

"Mm. I still wish I had got Firenze as my teacher though."

"Why?" asked Blaise. "Was he better?"

"He's kind of condescending," Theo admitted. "Keeps saying how humans are foolish to think that they have the power of Sight and how human forms of Seeing are a load of garbage. But he doesn't try to teach us the centaur ways either. Says we aren't equipped to know such deep secrets of the Universe. Just stares at the ceiling mostly. It's enchanted to look like the sky outside, you know? Like in the Great Hall."

Blaise frowned. "Then why do you wish you got him as a teacher?" he asked, evidently confused. "He doesn't sound very fun to me."

"Well, he's kind of hot," said Theo with a laugh. "I think I'd much rather spend one and a half hour staring at him watch the sky than make up predictions to please Trelawney."

Blaise's fingers twitched, and he suddenly realised that he was still holding his hand. Embarrassed, he let go quickly and brought his fingers up to scratch the bridge of his nose, trying to hide the blush that had crept up his cheeks. Blaise, however, seemed unaware of anything as he returned to his star chart.